The present invention relates to the use of potassium carbonate as the ionizing and clean-up agent of a sulfur-laden working gas for a magnetohydrodynamic electric generator wherein the potassium carbonate reacts with the sulfur to form potassium sulfate and more particularly to a thermochemical process for recovering the potassium carbonate from the potassium sulfate.
The theory of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) electric power generation has been known for many years, and potential for practical application of the MHD principle became a reality when it was discovered that required gas conductivity could be obtained in combustion gases at temperature as low as 3500.degree. F. with the use of a seeding material such as potassium carbonate. However, notwithstanding the solution of the gas conductivity problem the MHD generator continued to be economically unattractive as a result of costs arising out of the need for the replacement of seeding material and the clean-up of MHD exhaust gas to satisfy present day pollution criteria.